


Time For a Study Break

by TheIcyQueen



Series: Let's Play the Hypothetical Game! [2]
Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, College, Fluff and Humor, Friendship, Gen, friends dont let friends study for finals, gratuitous references to texas roadhouse, just friends being pals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 17:04:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17964560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheIcyQueen/pseuds/TheIcyQueen
Summary: Sometimes people like Ashley need to be forcibly removed from their study notes and textbooks. A mind's a terrible thing to waste, but like...come on. Who ACTUALLY studies before finals week?





	Time For a Study Break

**Author's Note:**

> Another little lighthearted piece while I crank away at my giant UD multi-chapter project ;) A super special thanks to Unicornaffair (and our other irl buds!!!) for inspiring this one, too.

> **Josh  
>  ** _hey ur at ur dorm right_
> 
> _…I am._
> 
> **Josh**  
>  _ok cool  
>  _
> 
> _Why?  
>  _
> 
> **Chris  
>  ** _not important!_
> 
> **Josh  
>  ** _yea just curious_
> 
> **Chris  
>  ** _curiosity is the spice of life!_
> 
> _Variety.  
>  _
> 
> **Chris**  
>  _huh  
>  _
> 
> **Josh**  
>  _what_
> 
> _VARIETY is the spice of life, not curiosity._  
>  _And seriously guys, I’m studying!_  
>  _Or at least I WAS, until you started texting._
> 
> **Chris**  
>  _aw man are we keeping you from your books??_  
>  _i'm sorry ash :((((  
>  _
> 
> **Josh**  
>  _yea me too_  
>  _super sorry_  
>  _hey heres a solemn promise from me to u_  
>  _we wont bug u w texting anymore_  
>  _no more texts_  
>  _promise  
>  _
> 
> **Chris**  
>  _scout's honor!  
>  _
> 
> _Neither of you is now, nor ever has been, a scout of any kind._  
>  _I don’t like this._  
>  _What are you planning?  
>  _

Ashley didn’t have to wait long for an answer—as she stared down at her phone, anticipating the appearance of a telltale “…” under either of the guys’ contact names, there came a knock at her door, so loud and so enthusiastic that she nearly jumped out of her own skin. She swiveled in her chair towards the door, giving her phone one last exhausted look before getting up.

There was none of her usual apprehension as she undid the deadbolt (she didn’t even check the _peephole_ , which was more than just a little uncharacteristic); even through the thick dorm room door, she could hear the familiar buzz of their stupid voices. “I _told_ you guys I was studying,” she said as she swung the door inwards, keeping her foot wedged behind it so that it only opened a few inches.

“Oh, is _that_ what you said?” Chris asked, feigning ignorance. “Whoops.”

“Not ‘whoops!’ Finals start on Monday, and I have an econ test first thing.” Her frown deepened when they just snickered. “ _You_ should be studying too. Don’t _you guys_ have finals coming up too?”

Without a shred of effort, Josh pushed the door open the rest of the way, ignoring her protests as he and Chris walked into the room. “Studying’s for squares, Ash.”

“Yeah, haven’t you heard? Cramming’s all the rage, now. _All_ the cool kids are doing it.”

“Ugh.”

“Listen to the man! No one knows more about passing on minimum effort like our dear Christopher.” Had Ashley _not_ been turned away from them, closing and locking the door again, she might’ve noticed the pointed, sidelong glance Josh shot Chris at that. “Y’know Ash, I’m sure if you needed any help with that, Chris’d help. I bet he’d _love_ to help you _cram_.”

She rolled her eyes, but waited a beat to turn back to them, all the same. “I’m being so serious, I _have_ to study for this. The final’s worth thirty percent of our grade, and—”

Josh rubbed his ribs where Chris had elbowed him, still grinning. “And what? You’re afraid you might end up on the low side of an A instead of setting the curve? Ashley, my darling, my sweet little peach,” he cupped her face in his hands, tipping her face up to his playfully. “I say this because I love you. Please…reach up into your ass—just as _far_ as you possibly can—and remove the stick that has been so very firmly lodged up there. Can you do that? Can you do that for _us?_ Please?” He guffawed as she stuck her tongue out at him, pinching both of her cheeks before releasing her face. “We were in the neighborhood and thought we’d drop in, is that a crime?”

Before she could answer, Chris pulled something out of his jacket pocket, offering it out to her. “We even brought _presents!_ How can you say no?”

Ashley’s eyes moved warily from one point to the next: Josh’s face, Chris’s face, Chris’s hand, and then back to Chris’s face. She took in a deep breath and let it out in an equally deep sigh, even as she reached out to take whatever he was holding. “This feels _entirely_ too suspi—okay, literally what _is_ this?” She looked down at the small plastic cup Chris had handed to her, her face crumpling into a preemptive cringe. “Why’s there a napkin on it? Why is—” she removed the napkin resting on top of it, revealing an ice-cream-scoop-sized ball of…something. She narrowed her eyes as she looked at the mysterious lump, sucking on her teeth as the answer occurred to her. “Did you _freaks_ …come all this way to bring me… _butter?_ ” The surprising thing was how _un_ surprised she was.

“Um, excuse me,” Chris interjected, pressing a hand to his chest in an attempt to seem hurt, “It’s _cinnamon butter_ from _Texas Roadhouse_ , you ingrate.”

“You know,” Josh added, “To spread on things.”

She went silent for a long time, staring down at the cup of butter. A few seconds passed that way, her expression difficult to read, her lips slightly pursed to the side. And then, almost begrudgingly, “…okay, this is, _admittedly_ , one of the best gifts I’ve ever gotten, but—” 

With a cheer, Chris and Josh high-fived.

“ _But!!_ Does this mean you actually went to Texas Roadhouse, ate dinner, and then brought me _nothing but butter?_ ” She looked back up to them, sighing when she saw their grins. “Not even some of that seasoned rice, huh?”

“We figured you already had something to eat. I mean, it’s _awful late_.”

Ashley sighed, but there was no hiding her own smile. “Fine, fine, whatever. Thank you for the butter.”

“ _Cinnamon_ butter,” Chris reminded her.

“Yeah, thanks for the _cinnamon_ butter.” She walked to the tiny nook she and her roommate used as a makeshift pantry, sticking the cup into the mini-fridge to keep it from melting. “You’re really too kind. Hey, while I’m in here, either of you want something to drink? We got, uh…Dr. Pepper, water, and uh…well, Dr. Pepper.”  
  
“What, no Perrier? No _La Croix?_ How uncultured.” Chris unslung his backpack from his shoulder, letting it drop unceremoniously onto Ashley’s bed. “Nah, I’m good,” he said, unzipping and digging around inside the bag’s main pocket. “Do you have any scissors, though? We’re gonna need scissors.”

Straightening back up, her eyebrows drew upwards and inwards in a familiar expression of nearly parental concern. “ _Why?_ Why are we going to need scissors?”

Josh reached around her before the fridge’s door swung closed, grabbing a can of soda and cracking it open. “Well, that’s part _two_ of presents, obviously!” He took a long swig, swallowed down a burp, and affectionately nudged Ashley’s shoulder. “Pfft. She thought we came all this way with only _butter_.”

“ _Cinnam_ —”

“Yeah, yeah, cinnamon butter, we get it Cochise. Don’t beat a dead horse, huh?” Josh turned back to her, “But seriously, where are your scissors? It is _imperative_ that we get some scissors.”

“The idea of willingly handing over sharp, pointy objects to either of you two isn’t really…my _favorite_ ,” Ashley admitted, pulling away from him long enough to rummage through her desk’s drawers. She pulled a slim pair of scissors out, looking between the two of them with a fair amount of dread. “Again, I shudder to ask, why do we need scissors?”

Chris plucked them out of her hand with a jovial little “ _Bwip!_ ” before pulling… _something_ out of his bag, laying it on Ashley’s bed, making sure to position it _behind_ his backpack so that she couldn’t see. The sound of cardboard being sliced open filled the room, and Ashley rolled her eyes to the ceiling, terrified of what _that_ could possibly mean. Josh was no help—he just took another drink, shrugging when she met his eyes. He handed her his half-empty can (and she _took_ it, not even fully knowing why), removing his own bag and similarly pulling something out.

With a low groan, she set Josh’s drink on her desk, closing her laptop with a quiet _click_. “You guys are doing _nothing_ to quell my anxiety, here.”

Josh momentarily looked up from whatever he was cutting open, brow furrowing. “I’m sorry, we’re not _quelling_ your anxiety?”

“Quell, quell, quell…look what we have here.” Chris snickered even as the other two moaned in agony. “Oh, fuck you guys, that was _good_.” The thought was punctuated by a loud, plastic-y sound that only added to Ashley’s apprehension. He glanced over his shoulder after a minute, shooting Josh a veiled look over the rims of his glasses. “Whaddya think?”

He continued to futz with whatever was hidden behind _his_ bag. “Oh, I think we’re probably good, don’t you?”

“I do concur, my good sir.” 

“Excellent.”

Ashley pressed her fingers up against her temples, rubbing there in agitation. “This ‘ _present_ ’ is making me…unspeakably nervous.”

“Good! You’ll need that. Keeps you on your toes.” Chris laughed to himself, the strange plastic-y _ker-chunk_ sound coming from where he knelt. “Look…Ash. We just… _figured_ , y’know…you’ve been pretty…well, what’s the word?”

“Uptight?” Josh offered.  
  
“Yeah, pretty upt—”

But Josh continued, ticking the words off on his fingers, “Obsessed, annoying, insufferable, _unbearable_ —”

“ _Hey!_ ”

“We get it, we get it!” Still laughing, he looked back to her, “You’re taking this whole ‘finals’ thing _wayyy_ too seriously, Ash. Finals week is a time to panic for maybe fifteen minutes at a time, and then promptly forget _everything_ you’ve ever learned in class. You can’t just study and study and study—that shit’s not _good_ for you.”

“Besides,” Josh sighed, “Brainiacs like you never _flunk_. I got this…let’s call it a _strong feeling_ …that you could miss _all_ of your finals and still pull…what, like a 3.8 for the semester? Please.”

She pouted, but didn’t exactly disagree with them.

Chris beamed, “ _So!_ We thought, hey, what do you _really_ need before finals?”

“A distraction,” Josh answered for him, gesturing sharply, his bag emitting a similar but somehow different _clunk_ sound. “You need a distraction.”

“And what are _we_ ,” Chris continued. “If not _distracting?_ ”

“What indeed.” She huffed out another sigh before something was _thrown_ at her and she squealed, instinctively scrambling to catch it. It took a second for the shape to register in her mind. When it did, her very first thought was for the half-full can of soda on her desk. “ _Guys!_ ” She instantly made herself as small as she could, pulling her arms inward as she scuttled to try and get the can as far from her laptop as possible. “My dorm isn’t big enough! It’s not big enough!” The first Nerf dart whizzed past her head and she screamed a frantic laugh, ducking out of the way. She managed to press herself up against the side of her desk, firing off a shot of her own, “If you break any of my stuff, I’ll _kill_ you!”

“Oh, real big talk, coming from— _son of a—_ ” Josh’s voice was cut off as he was hit square between the eyes. “Oh that’s it, you’re dead meat now, Ash.”

And she was right! There was almost _nowhere_ to hide in the tiny dorm room—the best they could do was try and squeeze behind pieces of furniture or slide partially under the bedframes, but even that only bought a sliver of protection.

Still, twenty or so minutes later, when there was a firm knock on the door and Ashley was forced to answer, red-faced and giggling, all thought of final exams had been lost to the ether. She stammered her way through a vague apology to the RA, nodding as she was reminded about quiet hours and guests needing to respect the other residents, yadda yadda yadda, doing her best to covertly flip the guys the bird behind her back as they snickered in the background. Only once the RA left and she was able to shut the door again did she turn to them, trying her damnedest to appear displeased; it was hopeless, though, and she was back to laughing almost immediately. Flopping down onto her bed, she wriggled around, pulling a few foam darts from underneath her and dropping them onto the floor. “That was so stupid,” she said, still laughing hard enough for her ribs to ache.

“We’re pretty good at stupid shit.” Unceremoniously, Chris dropped himself down onto the carpet, lying down after pushing a small pile of darts away. “Sort of our specialty.”

Josh leaned against her desk, absently spinning the empty cylinder of his gun, clicking the trigger all the while. “Man, you really gotta like…embrace the survival horror mentality with these shits, huh? You run out of ammo _real_ quick.”

“Yeah, and _you’re_ picking them all up before you leave.”

Smoothly, he grabbed a nearby dart, loaded it up, and shot at her prone form. Ashley squealed and recoiled when it hit her in the stomach, despite it not hurting in the slightest. Josh chuckled and dropped into her desk chair, leaning back until the chair’s front legs hovered precariously in the air.

The room went quiet, save for their occasional bursts of erratic laughter, the three of them catching their breath and fanning themselves to cool down. 

When her laughs tapered into muted yawns, Ashley rubbed at her eyes, stretching out contentedly across her bed. “Now, I’m not _usually_ one to admit that I was wrong…”

“Not _usually_ , huh?”

“ _But_ … _maybe_ … _perhaps_ …it’s _possible_ …you guys were right.” She nearly collapsed into giggles again when they both, completely independent of one another, gasped in response. “This was fun. Thanks for the stupid excuse to take a break.”

There was a click at the door, as if someone (read: a _roommate_ ) had unlocked it from the outside, and all three of them immediately turned to stare. “Hey, maybe don’t thank us _yet_ ,” Chris said. “You’re the one who’s gonna have to explain the two handsome, sweaty men and hundreds of foam bullets to _her_.”

“I’m more worried about explaining the butter, honestly.”

“ _Cinnam_ —”

Ashley threw a dart down at his face.


End file.
